LONDON (ShareCast) - (Sharecast News) - Distribution group Bunzl reported a rise in annual profit and increased its dividend as deliveries of Covid safety equipment offset a fall in business from the food and retail sectors.
The company on Monday said pre-tax profits for the year to December 31 rose 22.6% to £555.7m and the total dividend was lifted 5.5% to 54.1p a share. Revenue increased 8.4% to £10.11 billion.

Bunzl said it expected "robust" revenue growth in the current year on a constant currency basis "after excluding larger Covid-19 related orders which we do not expect to repeat" as vaccines are rolled out globally and pandemic restrictions are lifted.

"We anticipate that the recovery in sales of other products, as restrictions ease, will broadly offset the decline of smaller Covid-19 related orders, with recent acquisitions making an increasing contribution to the group's performance," it added.

Chief executive Frank van Zanten said Bunzl's supply chains and Asian sourcing and auditing operation allowed it to quickly source and deliver large quantities of Covid-19 related products, such as gloves and masks.

"Consequently, we were able to offset the negative impact that restrictions had on many of our customers' businesses, particularly in the foodservice and retail sectors," he said.

In a separate statement, the company said it had recently completed three more acquisitions for undisclosed sums. In January, it the company bought Deliver Net, a healthcare distributor to care home groups in the UK, while in February, it purchased Disposable Discounter, an online distributor of foodservice disposable products, and Pinnacle, a cleaning & hygiene in Canada.

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